Your Views

Keep your e-mails pouring in, it's good to know that there are lots of you out there with views and opinions.

To help you work out what is what, are now little icons to help you see biscuit related themes. And now you can see at a glance which are the most contested subjects via this graph (requires Flash 6.0 plugin).

Your e-Mails

Dear Nicey,
We have been a fan of your website for some time and we are now a resident in the USA where a biscuit is something to be had for breakfast with gravy on it, pretty disgusting. Both me and my husband love fig rolls and miss the Jacobs variety dearly. It is quite true when you say the American Fig Newtons are soft, and are a bit gritty too. We will be back in the UK at xmas and look forward to stocking up before we come back.
Gareth and Lisa Roberts
California, USA

Nicey replies: I recently heard that Sainsbury's number one selling biscuit was the fig roll, which caused me to become almost euphoric, although I wasn't entirely sure I knew why.

I might be wrong but they seemed to be completely imperishable; their disdain for bacteria of all descriptions made them a winner in the household structured around a limited economy. I take the point about the space programme but wonder if their impenetrable brilliance didnít lend itself to a robust war time ration pack.
Dipping them in tea had very little impact but softened them by a miniscule degree that proved to be of wondrous benefit to fig roll lovers with false teeth
My Nana used to buy them in bulk and treated them almost as if they were the biscuit equivalent of gold. I personally would rather have tried to eat solid gold; there was something musty about them that seemed to capture them in a time before vast biscuit choice led to the evolution of the average palate.
I respect them but could never digest them but long may they run
Gareth Bí
Hereford

Simon Bartle

Long live the fig roll I say. I am currently tucking into a 'bag' of these delicious treats by Barilla, under the brand 'Passioni Italiane - Fico' but translations aside, they are without doubt, fig rolls, and tastly too. Small I admit, but very 'figgy', with a soft texture.

Do you know of this brand?

One other point from your site. I would like stand firmly on the side of the pink wafer. I have fond memories as a child of these melt in the mouth biscuit wafers. I admit, each to his own, and me, occationally to my pink wafers.

Cheers.

Simon Bartle, UK, in Paris

Nicey replies: Yes we have heard of Barrila via the Parvesi Ringo, but we have yet to sample their Fig Rolls.

Aimee Jones

Dear Nicey, Wifey and younger member of staff,
Loving the toast rack icon - bordering on the inspired!† The Thermos flask is also a small triumph, but my strongest memories of flask based activities as a child do not include tea.† The beaches here in Wales are indeed fantastic, but can be a little nippy even during the summer months.† So Mam would often pack a thermos full of hot baked beans along with the sandwiches and whatnots when an outing to the seaside was in the offing - does this go against the Thermos ethos?† Also, to return to the toast rack, will this be utilised for other toasted baked goods?† I am thinking crumpets, tea cakes and slightly out of season Hot Cross Buns?
Sterling work as ever,
Aimee Jones†

Nicey replies: Firstly, yes I fully expect the new Toast icon to crop up whenever the broader issue of toasting raises its head. This is certainly in keeping with the general bandying around of icons such as the butter icon.

Secondly flasks of hot baked beans sounds utterly fantastic, I would be thinking of having a tee-shirt made that proclaims that you were raised in this way. Hoorah for your Mum and her bean flasks. I would of course still require a flask of tea to wash them down with.

Thirdly at Easter we were sat on a couple of Welsh beaches with our flask. The first attempt was a major disaster, having set out with the younger members of staff to dam up the stream that runs through Merthyr Mawr sand dunes. The stream had dried up, so we struck out for the coast, and anybody who knows the locale will know that this is quite a hike. No matter for I had provisions, or so I thought. On reaching the beach, we had forgotten the Fig Rolls, the Jaffa Cakes and the milk. I tried to console myself with a cup of black tea, which Wifey and Nanny Nicey declined. No, despite the claims of those who like it, black tea is fairly foul (they actually know this but insist that we should all drink it), especially when you really want a proper cup. I tried to amuse myself by attempting to construct a working cigarette lighter from the dozen or so I collected from the shore line, not that I smoke, I just thought it would be a useful survival trick in a sort of useless alternate Ray Mears way.

Kevin Johnson

Hello Nicey
My wife was bought your book at Christmas and it was my favourite present.
I must tell you of a memorable moment on holiday in Tunisia, back in February 1988. I was looking in the window of what must be described as a pastry shop in the historic town of Karaiouan. Displayed were a variety of delicacies but unmistakably in the middle were-hand made fig rolls sitting on a tray with a coating of syrup (imagine baklava in a Turkish cafe or restaurant.
It struck me then that in the days of empire British biscuit makers must have surely gained their inspiration from this country in which figs are grown in profusion.
They were very nice but of course lacked the practicality of a Jacobs pack which can be easily consumed anytime anywhere.
Regards
Kevin

Nicey replies: Yes it makes sense on every level. Perhaps this is why George Lucas was drawn to to Tunisia as a location for filming Starwars, given that its widely accepted (well me and Alice Gorman after I talked her round ) that Fig Rolls are perfect biscuits for space travel.